


Learning to Fall

by writingramblr



Category: Terminator (Movies), Terminator Genisys (2015)
Genre: Declarations Of Love, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Oral Sex, Post-Movie(s), Resolved Sexual Tension, Road Trips, Sharing a Bed, Shower Sharing, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-02
Updated: 2015-07-02
Packaged: 2018-04-07 08:51:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,262
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4257120
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/writingramblr/pseuds/writingramblr
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After the movie, Kyle, Sarah and Pops drive off into the sunset, headed anywhere.</p><p>Sarah has started to realize her feelings for Kyle, and the fact that she can have them, it's not going to get him killed and she faces a sudden challenge, what to do now without the world to save?</p><p>Can she allow herself to just be happy?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Learning to Fall

**Author's Note:**

> Post movie and all speculation, because I know there are 2 more confirmed movies, but who knows if they'll star Jai and Emilia?  
> No one.  
> So here's my little look at what should happen.

When they’re traveling on the road, after, riding in the back of the truck, while upgraded Pops drives, all because Sarah insisted on getting some sun, Kyle can’t keep his stupid mouth shut.

“Why don’t we stop somewhere and get a room? I know you’ve got money. Surely you had Pops invest during those 33 years in Skynet, and sell out before we blew them up right?”

He grins, and winks at her.

Sarah rolls her eyes, and lucky for him, doesn’t lash out with her foot and kick him off his seat.

“So what if we have money. I don’t want to stay in some dirty hotel. Much less with you.”

Her blue eyes flash in annoyance, but he spots something else there.

A hint of fear.

Not of him.

 _For_ him.

It’s the same look he saw before they jumped to 2017.

She’s remembering.

“Where are we gonna stay then? We can’t sleep in the back of the truck. Too bumpy.”

He wrinkles his nose and pretends to be stuck up about it.

As if he can complain.

He who grew up sleeping under bridges and in tunnels, slathered in mud so he wouldn’t show up on heat scans.

Sarah smiles for half a second before she shrugs,

“I don’t know about that. The hotel beds I’ve slept in have been pretty bumpy too. Sheets like sandpaper, now that I think about it. This doesn’t seem that bad.”

She pats the flat bed and looks past his left shoulder, seemingly declaring the conversation over.

Kyle remains silent, but doesn’t stop thinking about it.

*

Sarah fights the urge to hug her arms tightly about her, hiding her nerves and keeping her hands from shaking.

Their first time.

Once upon a time.

In another timeline.

She still clings to flashes of the memory.

She doesn’t understand how it’s possible.

She swallows and looks away from Kyle’s face. She can’t focus on him too long or she’ll start to want to kiss him again.

There was a funny saying always joked about after one had sex.

‘Did the earth move for you too?’

Well, it had only been a kiss, but she could have sworn she felt something inside herself shift and fall into place in those few seconds.

Her life, this life, wasn’t some fairy tale.

More like a cautionary one.

But it had all started with a dingy hotel, or motel more like, with a flickering sign and tiny rooms.

She and Kyle had been on the run from the original T-800. Not Pops.

She saw it now like a faded film strip.

Just bits and pieces.

If she hadn’t been so sure of it being the first and true timeline, she would have accused herself of what she’d yelled at Kyle.

‘Just a dream, all in your head.’

But it hadn’t been.

She’d seen way more of Kyle than she’d bargained for when they’d jumped to 2017 and yet, it was just like déjà vu.

She had always had memories of their short time together.

They’d always made the most of it.

She wanted to smile to herself, but she bit her cheek to keep it hidden.

She didn’t want Kyle asking her any questions or even attempting to flirt or tease.

The walls around her heart had already begun to rust and crumble.

She was daring to hope, to believe they would have a choice in the whole thing.

With Skynet gone, she was free.

But the question remained, if Pops was still around, hadn’t winked out of existence, was the threat really gone?

Not every Terminator had been destroyed, technically, so how safe was the world?

Maybe they could only ever delay Judgement Day.

Maybe it was inevitable?

Fingers clicked in her face and she frowned.

“What?”

She snapped at him, and he quickly pulled back his hand, as if she could break it off just by willpower alone.

“We’ve stopped.”

*

Kyle hated to get her attention like that, but he was wary of touching her without her consent.

It had taken immense pain to allow him to just hold her when they’d time traveled, and even earlier, when she’d kissed him, he’d been careful not to pressure her at all.

Not that any of it had mattered, because there Pops had been, to interrupt and kill the moment with his creepy faux smile.

“What?”

She was repeating herself.

She must have been lost very deep in thought.

Kyle tried to smile in a placating manner,

“We’re stopping for some food. All right?”

He tried again, offering her his hand, and her eyes dropped to stare at it briefly, before, miracle of miracles, she actually took it.

“Okay.”

It was just a lame pizza joint, a bump in the road and a stop along the way to their ultimate destination of hiding out from the world where another Sarah Connor and Kyle Reese lived, but still.

Being able to sit across from each other in a booth, enjoying some well cooked pepperoni pizza wasn’t a bad way to end the day after saving the world.

Pops stuck out a little bit, but as long as he left the smiling and talking to Sarah, everything was fine.

  
“We should find a cabin in the woods where you two can reside together. And mate.”

Sarah’s head fell into her hands, and Kyle blinked rapidly, and stared at the Terminator,

“What?”

“Oh my god. I told you to stop saying that!”

Sarah punched Pops in the side, an ineffective move, but nonetheless an expression of frustration, and Kyle thought he saw pink in her cheeks.

“I don’t want to live in the woods man. Fire hazards everywhere.”

Kyle finally spoke up, after he’d polished off nearly an entire pie himself.

Sarah shook her head,

“No, you’re right. We need to be somewhere off the grid, but with easy access to a city.”

“Denver, Colorado.”

The Terminator spoke again, and Kyle stiffened.

“That’s where the Skynet core is…was, will be?”

“It is likely.”

Sarah sighed,

“Okay. So we’ll head there, and find someplace we can stay, and keep an eye on things. If they even think about building anything, we’ll just sabotage it, right?”

Pops gave a creepy smile,

“That is an excellent plan Sarah.”

It was Kyle’s turn to shake his head,

“You both are ridiculous. You know that?”

Sarah looked fondly at Pops,

“Nah. We just work well together. You’re lucky whoever sent Pops to me didn’t have the sense to make him suspicious of you, like you are of him.”

Kyle snorted,

“Cause that would be hilarious.”

*

Denver was another day’s drive from where they’d stopped, so they did need to find a hotel for the night, because in the end, it was Pops who refused to allow Sarah to attempt to recharge, as he put it, in the back of the truck.

She protested, until he handed her a wad of cash, and Kyle gave her a look akin to ‘I told you so.’

“Fuck.”

The first time he’d heard her swear, and all because she was being ‘forced’ into actually sleeping in a soft bed.

Kyle might have laughed if he wasn’t afraid of her reaction.

Frugality said, share a room.

Practicality said, share a room.

But that was the last thing Sarah wanted, it seemed.

Kyle promised that if they couldn’t get two beds, he’d take the floor, and it only took thirty seconds for Sarah to tell him he was an idiot, and they could share a bed like two adults.

“I will be right by the car, in case of any trouble. Do not worry. Sleep well Sarah Connor.”

Pops didn’t exactly kiss her on the forehead goodnight, but he might as well have.

Kyle got the equivalent of the glare from the overprotective guardian and followed Sarah into the room.

It was luck, or just the universe laughing at them when the room turned out to have one large bed and a very uncomfortable looking couch.

But as Kyle had warned her, if you just walk up and ask for the cheapest room available on the second floor, that’s what you get.

The unexpected.

“I’ll take the couch.”

Kyle spoke up immediately.

Sarah rolled her eyes.

“Really? Again with the martyr complex. I’m not going to kill you in your sleep if your feet accidentally touch me.”

Kyle looked over at her, midway through taking off his shoes,

“Is that so? You promise?”

“What are you, twelve?”

Her words died in her throat as she remembered having parted with Young Kyle, who was just on the cusp of thirteen.

Kyle looked a bit sobered,

“Even that young I knew you were the woman I would love for the rest of my life. That’s fucked up right? That wasn’t even my real childhood. A happy accident.”

Sarah had just yanked open the bathroom door, wondering if a shower would be a luxury afforded by their final destination, and she slammed it shut again.

“Why do you have to keep reminding me?!? I’m not some paragon of virtue and justice, or the warrior queen you grew up hearing about.”

*

Kyle kicked off his other shoe, and walked towards her, recognizing the outburst as her emotions getting dangerously close to the surface.

He might have only really known her three days, but it didn’t matter.

“Yes, you were, you are, and you always will be. It doesn’t mean you can’t be anything else ever. It just means you had one future, and now you have an infinite number of them.”

He saw her swallow, and she didn’t retreat away from him, so he took that as a good sign.

“Do I really though?”

He nodded, and he could now reach out and touch her, if she’d let him.

“I just hope you’ll let me be in one of them. If you want.”

Sarah’s smile wobbled, but it was definitely there.

He could also see the beginnings of tears in her eyes, and he wished he could take away that sadness.

“If I didn’t want you here, Soldier, you’d have been long gone.”

The first thing she’d addressed him by.

When she’d only suspected who he was.

He loved it.

“Is that right?”

Before he could blink, she’d thrown herself at him, and was kissing him fiercely.

This time there was no one to interrupt, no one to stop them, and no reason at all to pretend he felt nothing with her in his arms.

*

Free falling off that cliff of uncertainty was incredible.

In one swift move, Sarah demolished the last of the walls around her heart, and let herself melt into Kyle’s embrace.

He was very strong, and smelled wonderfully like fresh air, no doubt thanks to having ridden outside with her all day.

But she still craved that sweetness of a hot shower, and she now wanted him to come along.

If only to help preserve water.

She bit his lip and broke the kiss, looking up at him, into a haze of green so dark, it reminded her of the trees reflection on the lake from her childhood home.

“Don’t suppose you’d like to clean off a bit before we jump into bed?”

She wasn’t sure where this playful side of herself was emerging from, but she suspected she was becoming slightly giddy from the overwhelming happiness he brought out in her.

After all, it was nice to know you were in the presence of someone who truly loved you. Every aspect of you. Without question.

He grinned down at her and his arms tightened just slightly,

“I thought you’d never ask.”

*

There was more messing around than actual washing that happened in the shower, and by the time the hot water ran out, Sarah was pretty impatient to dry off.

Breathless and tingling with warmth from the steamed up confined room, Kyle was tempted to just lift her into his arms and carry her back out to the bed, but something stopped him.

“Are you sure you don’t want to go slow with this whole thing?”

He gestured pathetically between the two of them, and didn’t mind staring at her now that it was pretty okay considering…

Sarah rolled her eyes, a growing habit.

  
“Of course I’m not going to just go crazy for you. We haven’t got anything… protection wise. How do you think this happened the first time?”

Kyle froze, and his hands actually slid off of her body from the amount of moisture in the air and on her skin.

“Oh. Right.”

Sarah smiled slightly,

“But it doesn’t mean ‘everything’ is off the table.”

Kyle coughed,

“Uh, yeah?”

Sarah snagged his hand and managed to make a shiver run down his back the way she moved her thumb over the back of his knuckles,

“Yeah. Let’s go.”

*

As it turned out, Kyle could technically be called a virgin, and Sarah was just going off of the rapidly fading memory fragments from their first time, but she still considered it an advantage.

She practically swore when she got him off in less than a minute with just her gentle touch.

She hadn’t even been trying, and all she’d been doing besides that was let him kiss her, and hover over her.

But when he gasped into her mouth and jerked against her hand, she couldn’t help the gleeful smile against his lips.

“You like that?”

“What do you think?”

He had to catch his breath for a minute after, and she just took that time to stare freely at him.

He was quite handsome, her future and past rescuer.

She couldn’t call him lightly muscled and defined, no, he was clearly in great shape to prepare for anything, and to be able to fight anything.

She ran a hand over his perfect abs, as his chest rose and fell, while he sucked in air as quickly as he could, he also reacted to her curious exploring.

“You make me embarrass myself and now you’re just getting to know what, how ticklish I am?”

He grabbed her wrist suddenly and brought it to his mouth, kissing the back of her hand, and making her freeze.

“What?”

“I don’t get to return the favor? How many times do you think I’ve wanted to hear you say my name? My real name. Not my last name. Not Soldier, as cute as it is when you call me that.”

Sarah felt her eyes widen as he stared at her, and she felt very exposed.

Forget being naked before him, for the second time in as many days.

She gulped a hasty breath of air.

It was the last wall.

The final fragment of rubble around her heart.

He was right.

She’d only been calling him Reese.

“Okay.”

Her voice was a tiny whisper, and he moved back towards her, gently climbing atop her, only to plant a soft kiss on her lips, and begin moving down, his large hands exploring her own body, learning as much as he could, as fast as he could, before attempting to do just what he wanted.

Return the favor.

She’d love him just for that if she could.

If she didn’t know better, she’d say his hands were shaking, as her own did slightly, finding their way to his short blond hair, and holding him steady.

He kissed her stomach and past, and his hands were now her enemy as they carefully held her thighs apart, so he could put his tongue to good use, lapping at her clit.

She had to let go of his head with one hand, lest she rip his hair out with her grasp.

Instead the sheets took the brunt of her strength, and when she came, not nearly as fast as him, but just as easily, it was his first name that fell from her lips as she saw stars.

One of his hands broke free and took hers off the sheets, lacing their fingers together, and inside Sarah’s mind, another piece of her past clicked into place.

The future wasn’t set, but some things were going to happen in every timeline.

*

Afterwards, Kyle just held her in his arms, and relished the chance to breath freely, and bury his face in the crook of her neck and shoulder, small as it was, he felt the most safe like that. Protecting her with every inch of his own body.

“I love you Sarah.”

He could feel her heartbeat under his hands and it seemed to speed up. But it was only the truth.

He’d said it before in so many words, and now he couldn’t help himself.

But before he could apologize, or attempt to say something else to defuse the tension, he felt her inhale and speak,

“I love you too Kyle.”

She wiggled around a little bit, perhaps acclimating to lying down with someone clinging to her almost too tightly for her to breath, and then her heartbeat settled again.

She was falling asleep.

She was safe with him, and now she had admitted it.

Kyle sighed in contentment and let his eyes close.

*

For once, for the first time in so many years, Sarah Connor dreamt of nothing.

Maybe it was the proximity to someone she felt safe with.

Maybe it was because there was no longer a constant need to worry and plan and prepare for the worst.

Or maybe she’d had nothing to dream about because the timelines had begun to merge and fade with reality.

She decided she didn’t mind making new memories for her and Kyle.

Somehow in the middle of the night they’d switched places.

Sarah woke up curled around Kyle, and she pressed a quick kiss into his shoulder blade, before pulling away to get dressed.

He awoke a short while later, and she smiled at him.

He looked remarkably younger and very disoriented in the morning.

She wondered if he always looked like that.

“Hey soldier.”

He blinked at her a few times,

“Sarah? Is it really you? Oh god, I thought this whole thing had just been another dream. I don’t think I’ve slept more than two hours straight in weeks.”

Sarah’s eyebrow lifted,

“Really? That’s horrible.”

Kyle shrugged, before slipping out from under the covers and giving her an eyeful.

“It’s how things worked, when at any moment you could be attacked.”

A chill went down Sarah’s spine as she imagined Kyle and their future possible son living in a world like that.

“Well, you’re here now. I won’t let you go without a good night’s sleep for more than a day, understand? Sleep is a luxury you can afford.”

Kyle nodded, and grinned at her,

“When I could have someone like you beside me, I’d sleep all day.”

Sarah managed a laugh,

“Yeah, tell me about it.”

She paused in the middle of pulling on her shoes when he walked over to her, looking down at her so fondly it almost made her heart hurt.

He reached out to stroke her cheek, and she froze.

“I hope you don’t regret anything about last night.”

She shook her head.

“Not at all.”

His hand dropped, and his green eyes looked distant,

“Then I don’t suppose you could just call me Kyle?”

She resumed putting her shoes on,

“Maybe. I’ll think about it.”

“Okay.”

A loud knocking on their door made both of them jump, and when Pop’s voice broke through the silence, asking if they were ready to leave, Sarah felt her whole body relax.

“We’ll be right out.”

*

**Author's Note:**

> I know that safe sex isn't just waiting to 'do it' with condoms, but hey, let's let these two kids have some fun.


End file.
